Middle East and North Africa

Lord Campbell of Pittenweem Excerpts

Tuesday 26th April 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hague]

I accept the hon. Gentleman’s congratulations in the spirit in which they were offered, and I am tempted to go over my whole statement again. Our attitude to the whole issue of change in the middle east is that if it goes right, it will be one of the greatest advances in human freedom and world affairs that we have seen—certainly since the end of the cold war, and in some ways comparable to it. If it goes wrong, however, leading to more authoritarian regimes or a long period of violent disorder, it will provide a serious threat to our own national security and that of the whole of Europe, with new breeding grounds for terrorism, uncontrolled migration and threats of extremism. We therefore have to do what we can to make sure that change goes in the right direction, not the wrong direction. That is what we want for Libya and what we want for other countries. We are able to help in each country in different ways, but that is the context in which our Libya policy sits.

[Sir Menzies Campbell (North East Fife) (LD)]

Notwithstanding my right hon. Friend’s careful and circumspect response to the shadow Foreign Secretary, is it not clear that the United Kingdom and France are disproportionately bearing the burden of the offensive air campaign? Why is it that our NATO allies are not making a better contribution, and is the Foreign Secretary disappointed by their failure to do so?

[Mr Hague]

It is certainly true that the United Kingdom and France make a huge contribution and, most of the time, the largest contribution to the campaign. I hesitate to use words like “disproportionate”, as I must say that the contribution—including an offensive strike capability—from countries such as Denmark and Norway is, considering their size as countries and the size of their armed forces, very much proportionate to the efforts that we are making. We should not think that only the United Kingdom and France are contributing. There are 16 nations involved in the military activity. As my right hon. and learned Friend knows, Arab nations are also involved. In response to our recent requests, other countries have brought other military assets into play—Spain, for example, providing additional air-to-air refuelling capability and Italy bringing in ground-strike capability. At all times, the United States continues to supply about a quarter of all sorties flown, even in periods when it is not taking part in ground strike. The right hon. and learned Gentleman can see that the burden is spread more widely than the headlines sometimes give the impression, but would we like a greater contribution from some other nations and did we say so at the NATO meeting in Berlin? Well, yes, we did.